White Evangelical Protestants (fl. 1968- ) is a term the US press uses for White American Protestants who tell pollsters that they are an “evangelical or born-again Christian”. The term only goes back to 1968.
In the US they make up about:
- 76% of Evangelical Protestants
- 40% of Protestants
- 35% of Republicans (over 50% in Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee and North Carolina)
- 31% of Whites
- 19% of voters
and much of the religious right.
- Size: About 60 million.
- Location: Their heartland is Greater Appalachia, which runs from West Virginia to Texas, the same place that gave us Elvis, NASCAR, Walmart and the Klan.
- Examples: Billy Graham, Jimmy Carter, George W. Bush, Rick Warren, James Dobson, Chuck Swindoll, Chuck Colson, Mike Pence, etc.
- Subculture: Promise Keepers, WWJD, Veggie Tales, Christianity Today, Wheaton College, Focus on the Family, Fuller Seminary, Campus Crusade for Christ, those novels about Amish women, etc.
- Out-groups: Mexicans, Muslims, Blacks, gays, Jews, liberal Protestants (too loose), Christian fundamentalists (too strict), Catholics (off-base, not serious), secular humanists (godless), atheists (also godless).
- Denominations (listed in order of % White in 2014):
- 95% Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod,
- 88% Church of the Nazarene,
- 85% Southern Baptist Convention,
- 80% Presbyterian Church in America,
- 69% Churches of Christ,
- 66% Assemblies of God,
- 65% Church of God (Cleveland, TN),
- 37% Seventh Day Adventist,
- etc.
Notice that “Evangelical” cuts across older labels like “Presbyterian” and “Lutheran”. Many Evangelical churches are non-denominational.
- Bible translations: the top four in 2016: NIV, KJV, ESV, NKJV.
- Their god: not the same god as Muslims (and Catholics?).
Beliefs: According to the National Association of Evangelicals, the largest coalition of Evangelical churches, an Evangelical is someone who believes:
- The Bible is the highest authority for what I believe.
- It is very important for me personally to encourage non-Christians to trust Jesus Christ as their Savior.
- Jesus Christ’s death on the cross is the only sacrifice that could remove the penalty of my sin.
- Only those who trust in Jesus Christ alone as their Savior receive God’s free gift of eternal salvation.
Note: Many Blacks, Latinos, Catholics and Mormons believe these four things too. Some even go to the very same churches as White Evangelical Protestants. But because they tend to have different political opinions, pollsters see them as separate.
The Southern Strategy – or how Jesus Became a White Republican. In the 1960s, few White Evangelical Protestants voted Republican. By the 1980s, a third did; by the 2010s it was up to two-thirds. Since the 1960s Republicans have appealed to their racism and religion through hot-button issues (abortion, crime, etc) to get their support for government policies that benefit the top 1% (tax cuts for the rich, warming the globe, etc).
The 2016 election: In December 2015 they favoured fellow Evangelicals Ted Cruz and Ben Carson over Donald Trump for president. In October 2016, even in the wake of Trump’s sex scandal, 69% favoured him over Hillary Clinton – at a time when only 28% of other Americans did. The scandal had no effect on their support.
Racism: After Ferguson burned the second time, 66% thought the US criminal justice system treated all races equally – when only 46% of other Whites (and 12% of Blacks) did.
– Abagond, 2016.
Update (November 11th 2016): In the 2016 election, 81% of White Evangelical Protestants went for Trump, much higher than the 69% he polled at in October. Source: CNN.
Update (November 20th 2017): In 2011 just 30% of White Evangelical Protestants believed that an elected official “who commits an immoral act in their personal life can still behave ethically and fulfill their duties” as a public servant, according to PRRI. In 2016 that had jumped to 72%. Source: Boston Globe.
See also:
- White Liberals
- Examples
- on the issues:
- books about:
- Jesus Christ
- White
- Protestant
- US
- The 2016 election for US president
- English Bible translation
- Ferguson II
- Southern Strategy
- Larycia Hawkins – kicked out of Wheaton College for believing Muslims worship the same god as Evangelicals.
- Bill Bennett: The Death of Outrage – He is Catholic, though.
How they love to come to Africa to spread the good word as they spy for Uncle Sam.
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I was raised in this environment in the 1970’s (in those days they used the term “Charismatic Christians”) and could talk quite a bit about it. Early Evangelicals in the Northern states were quite progressive politically, especially on issues like the environment (we should be good stewards of God’s creation) and racial equality (mistreating fellow humans based on race is a sin).
Meanwhile, the Goldwater/Nixon “southern strategy” was courting southern segregationists who were separating from the Democratic party due to LBJ’s support of the Civil Rights Act. These people were straight-up bigots. They didn’t like blacks, gays, etc.
Progressive evangelicals were part of Jimmy Carter’s election. Jimmy Carter held himself out as an Evangelical. However, the southern strategy was gaining momentum. Keep in mind the timeline: LBJ became POTUS in 1961 after Kennedy was assassinated. In the election of 1964 he beat Goldwater by a large margin. His popularity was in part due to his association with Kennedy, who was essentially sainted after his assassination, and in part due to the Civil Rights Act.
But thereafter he escalated the war in Vietnam and people took to the streets. the press turned against him, painting him as dishonest. There was criticism of his perceived high levels of government spending, and his Great Society program was viewed as a wasteful boondoggle and a failure.
The Democratic party began to schism as a result of the pressure, and LBJ lost its support. He did not seek the nomination for a second term. The party nominated Hubert Humphrey, a Minnesota democrat whose cadre consisted of the worst parts of the Democratic party — mostly labor unions, which by then were perceived (correctly) as a sort of low-scale mafia.
Humphrey was nominated but did not enjoy unified party support. Nixon won easily in 1968 on his “silent majority” message. My own parents bought this hook, line, and sinker. Nixon did not need the “southern strategy” to win that election, but the election was an opportunity for the Republican party to mobilize its southern rednecks and bigots and coalesce them into a wing of the party.
We know what ultimately happened to Nixon. Gerald Ford took office burdened by Nixon’s legacy. The nation was still concerned about “law and order”, and viewed all of the various protests of the prior 15 years with hostility (lumping together the Vietnam protests, Civil Rights protests, and some of the weirdo stuff that was going on such as the Manson murders (1971), Patty Hearst (1974), etc.). The SCOTUS Miranda opinion was announced in 1966. Crime in NYC in the 1970’s was at all-time highs. The sum of these kinds of events was leading the nation to conclude that law and order were breaking down. Vigilante movies like Dirty Harry (1971) started to become popular.
Although Ford was a decorated military veteran and a handsome former football player who was viewed as a law and order man, Jimmy Carter won the 1978 election by a narrow margin, propelled in part by the Northern Evangelical vote. Those voters perceived Washington in general to be a place of liars and thieves. Jimmy Carter was perceived to be a voice of honesty in the midst of a cesspool of corruption. However, Carter’s administration almost was beset by the same criticism of “big government/big spending” that plagued LBJ.
Further, and to the point of this blog post, by then the Republican southern strategy had succeeded in creating a viable political force out of the southern bigots who were still angry about the Civil Rights Act and, quite frankly, the Civil War itself. This is the roots of modern-day Evangelical movement. During the Carter administration, the IRS began revoking the tax exemption of some religious-based universities that openly engaged in racial discrimination. The Evangelicals (incorrectly) blamed this on Carter (in fact this was begun under Ford).
It was this desire to preserve the bigotry in beloved southern religious institutions that propelled the Southern vote in favor of Reagan in 1982. Thus the separation between Christianity and Evangelicals began. Carter was a pious, church-going, God-fearing man. By all accounts he was probably the most devoutly Christian of presidents, by a wide margin. Reagan was divorced and remarried. He was a product of Hollywood. There was little in his life to suggest he had any sincere Christian beliefs, at all. Yet he enjoyed widespread Evangelical support over Carter. Many will say this was because of Roe v. Wade, but I think this is not correct. The Evangelical opposition to Carter was over racial discrimination. They felt it was their right to practice this if their version of Christianity called for it. Most Evangelicals were Protestant, and at the time abortion was viewed as a Catholic issue.
Since that time, of course, abortion has become a proxy issue used by the Repubs to maintain their Evangelical support. This is further evidence of how Evangelicals is no longer synonymous with Christian. There was a time when Protestants and Catholics viewed each other like Shias and Sunnis. Within the modern version of Evangelicals, though, that distinction is meaningless, because Christian faith itself is meaningless. In its place, the Evangelicals have fed on a gumbo of racial hostility, jingoism, and chest-thumping (Caucasian) American exceptionalism, hence their groundswell support for Trump, who is from a Christian perspective the diametric opposite of Jimmy Carter.
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Praise Glory!
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I was getting ready to ask how the evangelicals became so strongly conservative, but Blanc2 has set out a thorough explanation.
Although I didn’t grow up in an evangelical family, it was around me; there were some people in our church and community who were evangelicals or charismatics (I remember being told in the ’70s that the charismatic movement in the Catholic church was similar to the evangelicals). Back then, they were a lot more like Jimmy Carter or even the “Jesus Freak” hippies. They devoted their time to working with the poor and trying to build a better society.
By the early ’80s, it seemed like there had been a switch to evangelism as we know it today: conservative, selfish, etc.
Also, I always thought the Lutheran Missouri Synod was more fundamentalist than evangelical? I wasn’t raised in that tradition, so maybe I’m wrong, but that’s always how I’ve heard them described.
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@ LoM
I challenge you to go a week of active commenting without bringing or alluding to the “I” word.
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Lord of Mirkwood, interesting observation. My young childhood was in Appalachia and I have a lot of extended family there. I like your line: “muscular, gun-toting, anti-intellectual right-wingism.” Very descriptive of what I see in that part of the nation.
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
I never said your comment was off-topic. Usually you manage to find a way to tie the “I” word into the topic at hand.
The reason for my challenge isn’t because I thought you were off-topic, but because I don’t think you can do it, not even for a week, and I was curious to see if I could be proven wrong.
As for your comment itself, I thought it did have some merit but was overly generalized. I noticed that you changed Abagond’s “White Evangelical Protestants” to “Anglo Evangelical Protestants,” thus ignoring the fact that many white evangelicals are from other European backgrounds (e.g., German, French). Also, to the best of my knowledge (correct me if I’m wrong), Ulster Loyalists tend to be mainstream Anglican (perhaps even High Church?), which — at least religiously speaking — is almost diametrically opposed to evangelical thought and worship style.
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Oh yeah, the Donald looks really interested in the pastor praying for him. His look says, “now you can kiss my ring.”
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@LoM
“This strain of people comes straight from the British settlers in the North of Ireland. Before they settled Greater Appalachia, they were at the forefront of the British occupation of Ireland… Anglo Evangelical Protestants in the U.S. are so similar to Ulster Protestants, it’s uncanny. Down to the muscular, gun-toting, anti-intellectual right-wingism.”
According to The Scotch-Irish: A Social History by James G. Leyburn (1962), a large percentage of White people in Greater Appalachia are descended from the Scotch/Ulster Irish. That group was an amalgam of Presbyterian Lowland Scots, Puritan English settlers and Calvinist French Huguenots.
During their time on the Ulster Plantation in Northern Ireland, the three groups were united in their:
✢ strict Protestantism (which included a belief that they were among God’s Select)
✢ affinity for authoritarianism (especially the Lowland Scots)
✢ disdain for privacy (they approved of strict policing of private behaviors)
✢ hostility and violence toward the natives (the Irish Catholics)
✢ belief that education was only good for training of the clergy
✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢ ✢
They migrated to America in four main waves: 1717-18, 1725-29, 1740-41, and 1771-75. They settled primarily in Southeast Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia, and the Piedmont region of North Carolina. Their descendants later spread out to Kentucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas.
That somewhat corresponds to the reddest states on the map Abagond posted.
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@dorisjean23
Mrs. Trump looks amused by the whole thing.
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
“but including some Anglicans, would you believe it?”
Not only would I believe it, I was already aware of it. The English didn’t just make an active effort to bring Presbyterians into the fold — they spread propagandistic lies about battlefield betrayals, turncoats, etc., in order to sow suspicion and discord between the Catholics and the Protestants of Ireland. Classic divide and conquer once again.
I wasn’t talking about the denominational breakdown of the entire Protestant population but rather of those who belong to the Loyal Orders. Perhaps I’m mistaken in this, but I was under the impression they tended to be staunch Anglicans.
I do wonder if there is really a strong evangelical presence within the Presbyterian and Methodist populations in Ireland, or if they are more traditional and mainstream? Do they lay on hands, speak in tongues, etc.?
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my best friend fred ‘dropped me’ or whatever as a friend, via a mailed note with some food … said i was not with jesus… i went to the steve taylor (“i want to be a clone”) concert trippin on mescaline, and hmm… saw petra too…
it’s sad because at st. bonaventure the monks had you know, some buddhist monks in for a lecture and discussion, it’s so hard to deal with them (evangelicals). as long as you respect the whole muslim thing, they really don’t bother you about it, but answer questions for sure.
evangelicals seem to be mostly baptist of various … stripes, and some 7th day adventists, and i think JW counts too, of course snake handling and strychnine ingestions can be found in the most extreme! mostly down south or in the midwest i think
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healing ie the laying on of hands is an appropriate work of faith so called to be found in general and ministry of course outreach and you know, there could be some tax free money involved!
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wow they have some high tech stuff in church now with the lyrics projected and the ‘light rock’ band, or so forth ie in the white side of it ok apparently that’s part of this thread.
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i dont know why i picked the goddess of luck, her name is fortuna but it just kinda stuck
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i think the works of faith ie laying on of hands for healing comes from the disciples like got honorable mention for miracles at the end of the NT
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the mormons or church of latter day saints is quite outwardly bound in regards to canvassing certain neighboorhoods; as is the jehovah’s witnesses, they know the neighborhoods around town!
but when you consider the mormon or JW gospel is not mainstream christianity so it seems those non-standard books are different too
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@ v8driver
Laying on of hands and speaking in tongues are definitely in the NT (possibly Acts?). They just aren’t part of worship as practiced by mainstream traditional white Protestants.
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yeah that reminds me… last time? in county jail? the correctional officer processing me back from a visit from my wife, he was an Indian (South Asian) fellow, and he ran a real quick altar call right he said i’m going to pray for you and it turned in to him wanting me to swear allegiance to jesus christ, and he really thought he was going to close the deal, he asked me why i couldn’t do that, i had to tell him (the next time i saw him of course) it was the same reason he accepted christianity over his native hindu or muslim religion, he said he had lived in saudi arabia and india
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@Solitaire
that’s right glossolalia too! i think there is intercession praying and timeline progression too, yeah evangelicals aren’t strictly ‘mainstream’ but they are consistent for the most part, standard catholics and anglicans etc would probably see them as the ‘born again’ guy
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Ulster Scots on my mother’s side. The Wallace’s that I’m related too came to the U.S. in 1734. That’s ten generations back to Joseph Wallace. My father’s side goes back four generations to Cork Ireland.
I was raised in a Presbyterian church, went to Christian schools, was taught about the Orange men, and my parents were very right wing. I belive they voted for Geroge Wallace. Race was never talked about directly but communists and foreigners were anti American. Blacks and Hispanics were poor people who lived in the other parts of town. MLK was a communist who caused trouble.
Religion helped hold together and justify the beliefs of my parents.
Looking back now it seems like brain washing.
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mainstream protestant xianity i think is more lutherans, methodists, moderate baptist, etc. doesn’t presbyterianism deal with predestination, which is not ‘strict’ interpretation of the gospel as the ‘evangelicals’ would typically argue?
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@ v8driver
Evangelicals are more like a movement that started within mainstream Protestant churches. They wanted (among other things) to have a more emotional, openly spiritual type of worship service closer to how they believed the apostles and the early church worshipped. Some congregations that became highly evangelical stayed within their traditional Protestant denominations, so you can have a situation where the Baptist church on one side of town is rather staid and traditional while the Baptist church on the other side is very evangelical. But as Abagond noted in the post, a lot of evangelicals ended up leaving their traditional Protestant denominations and forming “non-denominational” churches.
Presbyterians are one of several denominations that come out of the predestination tradition, which goes way back to Calvin, maybe before. I believe that the major branches of Presbyterians today vary in how they interpret predestination and how much they adhere to that belief. Michael will know better than I do, though, since he was raised Presbyterian.
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@ v8driver
I’ve noticed over the years that people who were raised Catholic often have trouble getting their head around the fact that there really isn’t one Presbyterian Church, one Lutheran Church, one Methodist Church, etc. There are multiple branches within the various denominations because once the Protestants schismed from the Catholics, they just kept going and continued to split like crazed amoebas.
If you go to the wiki page for the Presbyterian Church in America and start reading under the history subhead, you will get dizzy in the first two paragraphs trying to keep all the splits and mergers straight.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presbyterian_Church_in_America
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what i was really getting at is there is there is the creationism tenet and of course the earth is 6000 years old, the bible is god’s exact word, etc, so there seems to be some patterns of consistent belief in those churches that are considered ‘evangelical’.
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Busy with work. No time to join in this thread, but I do find it fascinating. I’ve often thought of whether it is legitimate to view a nation’s personality in that way, carrying veins of weltanschauung from the roots of the populace. Australia, for example, peopled by criminals shipped there from England, and to this day a violent, homophobic, racist, hostile society.
Police forces in the early 20th century along the east coast were largely Irish American. They were typically very corrupt, including and especially during Prohibition. That vein of “we are above the law and can do anything we want” still infuses the law enforcement community to this day, and is the root of the populist criticism of police that we see incorrectly framed in the media (incorrect because they limit the focus to shooting of black men, when in reality the problem is much larger and much broader than that).
I’ve often hypothesized that there is a proportional relationship between police corruption and crime. Police corruption in the 1970’s, especially in big cities like New York and Chicago, was at an all time high. Crime was also at an all time high. Do the roots of these issues trace back to those Irish themes?
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Up until I was 15 ( although i was baptised Catholic I was confirmed Epsicopalian) i was Episcopalian, which is basically the US ‘arm’ of the Anglican or UK church, and of which my mom said “it’s more catholic than the catholic church.” LOM is right, no hail marys, no rosaries, and extra words in the LP. Just goes to show how ridiculous the whole catholic vs protestant mess is!
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orange_Order
Seems pretty generically protestant (in most cases) and mostly following the nicene creed instead of the apostles’ creed. In Episcopal church they made us swear ‘i believe in the nicene creed…’
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https://www.google.com/amp/s/celticanglican.wordpress.com/2007/06/18/what-are-the-creeds-episcopalians-use/amp/
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@ v8driver
Sorry about that, I thought you’d been raised 100% Catholic. Yeah, the Anglicans/Episcopalians are very close to Catholicism, especially the High Church branch. I think it has to do with the original reason the Anglicans split off, which boils down to Henry VIII wanted to marry Anne Boleyn. In reality of course it was a bit more complicated than that, but there wasn’t a huge doctrinal difference like with the Anabaptists.
Going back to Presbyterians and predestination, I read up a little on it, and it appears they interpret certain Bible verses as supporting that belief. If that’s correct, then it seems an evangelical Presbyterian wouldn’t have any trouble reconciling predestination with the belief that the Bible is their highest authority.
I’m going to go out on a limb and say that while all evangelicals believe in the gospel as the literal and infallible word of God, they don’t necessarily interpret every verse the same way.
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Hypocrites and racist.
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Hallelulia! Praise glory. Praise the Lord and pass the dough! You can get unending jokes from these people! The scary thing is that they vote!
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Blanc2
Very interested set of information you provided there. I never thought about the correlation between police corruption and crime. I wonder if police corruption is higher in high crime areas and lower in low crime areas? Hmmm…
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Interesting*
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
Doesn’t explain the Quakers.
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I as a fundamentalist Bible-literalist Christian am tired of the politics and the mixing up of politics with Christianity.
The most important influence and job of the Christian has always been to preach and teach Bible verses PEACEFULLY on how to be saved through believing alone in the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus for eternal life.
Acts 16:31: “And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.”
We are to preach peacefully that message, and if people reject it, we should move to the next people and place. Very simple.
In the New Testament you never read about Jesus or the apostles and disciples campaigning for politics or making it some big issue. But the issue of us preaching salvation to souls, not offices was VERY important,
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Are not most of them Zionist ” Christians ” who have elevated Israel above Christ?
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Where most these people live if you are super marginalized minority or look like one it can very dangerous for you.
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Religion proof we as a species still have a lot of evolving to do.
Also this post is evidence for my general hypothesis: you can say and believe almost anything.
Observation : there are less than 5 major religions but they all esp christainty have hundreds if not thousands of subdivisions.
This may be a universal process iinherent to large populations.
As to the political ,historic, and phenotypic group aspectsaspects ,I intend to comment later.
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I also notice this post seems geared toward the white skinned members of this blog and we non whites wouldn’t’ resent it all hadn’t’ etc etc you’ve heard know it and of course still Don’t care – making your pretense exposed by this religion as meaningless as any thing from religion esp in these modern times.
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@Mbeti
There are thousands of people of color that are Evangelicals… They truly are able to compartmentalize the majority of the ‘White’ Evangelicals that probably despise them and continue worshiping this asinine religion without a second thought. As for me I take scholarly approach. This religion business is still significant because of its social studies aspects as recorded history and social culture.
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Halellulia!
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“Acts 16:31: “And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.” – Eric
The only people or house He, the Lord came for was the people of Israel. Matthew 15:24 states: “But He (Jesus) answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” And of course, the House of Israel was, presently is and will always be Black! I have no idea why these so called White Evangelicals are trying to portray to the world that they have a monopoly on the scriptures, morality and everything in between. They, … whites have a monopoly on nothing!
These are essentially the same regenerated group of people who tied Jesus (Yahawashi in Hebrew) on columns of wood, rejected Him, dragged him through the streets, yelling obscenities and pierced His heart. And who tied Him up and placed Jesus on a tree, … white people (the Romans)!
Jeremiah 14:2 “Judah mourneth, and the gates thereof languish; they are BLACK unto the ground; and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up.” By the way, Jew is a derivative of Judah, one of the twelve Black tribes of Israel.
We are to preach peacefully that message, and if people reject it, we should move to the next people and place. Very simple. – Eric
Come on Eric! You mean to tell me you can do no better than this? Your comments clearly display a level of ignorance of the scriptures. Where in the Bible does it state that “We” are supposed to preach peacefully the message of Christ (Yahawashi)?” Where in the Bible is it written that “We” should move on to the next people if they reject the “message?
Sorry Eric, but its’ not that simple. White people are the ones that killed Him, along with some Uncle Toms, Sadducees, Pharisees and Uncle Ruckus’ of the day.
Ezekiel 25:14 “And I will lay my vengeance upon Edom by the hand of my people Israel: and they shall do in Edom according to mine anger and according to my fury; and they shall know my vengeance, saith the Lord GOD.”
Esau or Edomites are the forefathers of today’s white people.
Matthew 10:34 “Think not that I (Jesus) am come to send peace on earth: I came not to send peace, but a sword.”
Parenthetically, placing your hands on someone or quickly approaching with a sword in hand doesn’t appear to be a state of peace after all!
Have a great day Eric, Selah!
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@TeddyBearDaddy
“This religion business is still significant because of its social studies aspects as recorded history and social culture.”
Agreed. That is one approach to religious studies.
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I don’t understand this evangelical stuff at all. To me it just doesn’t seem God like. All that rapture and speaking in tongues. Someone grabbed my hand and started gabbeling off in tongues at me once on a religious retreat. It terrified me, I ran out of the room crying. God wouldn’t do that scary sh!t, that’s devil language! I’m Catholic, I like my religion holy and old fashioned, Quiet and humble seems much more spiritual than bopping about having orgasms and fainting all over the place! Inner spirituality is what matters. If you are a spiritual person you don’t have to prove it.
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@ Mirky
Yes stained glass. Incense, pomp and ceremony. Not everyones cup of tea but that’s what makes me personally feel closest to my God. I don’t even raise my hands for the Lords Prayer which some Catholics do. I really don’t like anything like that at all.
I had to google that LOTR quote. But yes, imo that is very descriptive of what the charismatic branches of Protestantism are.
In my village in Ireland there where/are 2 churches. The Catholic one and the Church of Ireland (Protestant) one. Superstition said if you walked backwards around the prody church 3 times you would come face to face with the devil. I don’t know if it was true or not as no one ever dared try it out!
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@Zoe Jordan
“God wouldn’t do that scary sh!t, that’s devil language! I’m Catholic, I like my religion holy and old fashioned, Quiet and humble seems much more spiritual than bopping about having orgasms and fainting all over the place! Inner spirituality is what matters.”
There are many ways of worshiping the Divine. A group of people can be contemplative or celebratory or use mind altering substances (like peyote) to commune with the Divine.
Various religious groups utilize:
❅sound through drumming, chanting, speeches, shouting, humming or singing
❅touch through prayer beads, rosaries immersion in water or walking over coals
❅smell through perfumes, incense and other burnt offerings
❅taste through sacred foods and drinks
❅sight through colors, statues, decorations, masks and symbols
Many people throughout the African diaspora use motion to access the Divine. Sacred dancing is an important part of African American religious experience. Most African American culture is participatory and kinetic. In some African American religious settings, call and response in sermons and songs is perfectly normal. In some African American churches, when people are “moved by the spirit”, they will shout, dance, go into a trance and speak in tongues.
In the first decades of the 1800s, some White American Protestants in the Southern US adopted some African practices in their churches in much the same way Black American Protestants adopted European elements in their churches. Many modern White Evangelicals in the US are descended from those people who Africanized elements of their worship.
So while you may be most familiar and comfortable with quiet contemplation, not everyone worships the same way. Spirituality can be expressed in many ways and there is more than one path to the Divine.
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@ Afrofem
Thank you so much for the above comment. You said it far better than I could have.
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Growing up with a parent that was catholic turned born again Christian I think I can clarify your question. Catholics and evangelicals worship the same god but evangelicals typically believe Catholics aren’t “saved” because they are trying to earn their way to heaven with good deeds and confession to clergy. Evangelicals believe there should be no Intermediary between god and his children should appeal to him directly. More importantly evangelicals believe the catholic habit of earning their way to salvation is a rejection of Christ’s death on the cross. Belief in his sacrifice and giving over to him and turning away from sin is all that is needed for salvation. Trying to earn it is a rejection of what Christ did. I have heard evangelicals say Catholics are the toughest people to save because they already think they’re saved. It all makes my head hurt.
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Hi Afrofem,
Absolutely. That is why I said in my 2 comments that this is just my personal preference. I don’t find anything spiritual in charismatic worship. My one experience of tongues really frightened me, why would my higher power speak to me in a garbled language that I could not possibly understand and that, to my ears, sounded evil?
I understand that when Africans in the Americas and Caribbean where forced to worship the Christian God form elements of their African God(s) and worship remained with them. Hence, for example, Catholicism mixed with East African Vodun to create Voodoo. So it seems that ‘White Evangelical Protestants’ have taken part of their original worship, mixed it with an already mixed branch to create yet another new form of worship! Is the agenda not more to do with politics and personal gain than love of God? We have white evangelicals visit here from America from time time to time. I have watched some little of their ‘shows’ online (Never live). And These men (are they ministers?) are completely actors. They are making sh!t loads of money, have thousands in their audience – who have to pay to see them! (like really?) and actors in the audience have hands laid on them and are ‘healed’ of all sorts of ailments and disabilities.
The Gospel churches are beautiful. The singing is beautiful. The call and response is beautiful.The love for God shines. It’s just not my personal way. I find it wonderful but it doesn’t make me feel closer to God however, I know I would be welcome, even as a Catholic I would not be outcast, I would be treated the same as any member of the congregation. Not so sure I would in a CWP church with my political beliefs and personal life choices. In fact, even in my own church some of the sacraments (e.g. communion) are not available to me because of my life choices. On this I am out of sync with the RC church. I don’t believe God is as judgmental as they would have me believe.
I honestly believe 90% of the CWP’s are fake. Well, they obviously are if they are right wing as you guys seem to be saying. Self fulfillment and prejudice are not Spiritual facets. God is a completely inclusive ‘being’ (or whatever you choose to see him/her /it as) Their God, however appears to be very exclusive.
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@Ames
It is all a bit crazy isn’t it! We (Catholics) used to be able to buy ‘indulgences’ which earnt us a few steps nearer to Heaven. We could literally pay our priests money to guarantee us less punishment in purgatory and quicker access to eternal life. I expect there is a high population of rich medieval persons in Heaven now because of this practice! lol
Actually organised religion really can be a vile and abusive thing if one looks deeply at it. If there is a God I’m quite sure he loves everyone – Possibly with the exception of Mr. Trump who might well have come from the ‘Other guy’!
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@Mirky
I saw Solitaires challenge – It will be hard but you can do it, and be more of a man for it! LOL
Tbf you do say the I word like allllllll the time!
is féidir leis an ádh na hÉireann a bheith in éineacht leat!
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@Afrofem:
Amen!
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I remember that Marimba Ani’s book had an interesting chapter on Catholicism vs Protestantism but I have books packed up and can’t put my hand on it right now. The basic thrust was that Catholicism was a more suitable religion to be accepted by non-Europeans because the nature of its rituals was closer to their existing religions. Austere Protestantism, however, was better for establishing ethics within European society and to produce people who would function as business men and leaders within it esp. as Capitalism rose.
I have discovered that even though non-European spirituality often involves fanstatic symbolic imagery they’re often quite grounded in meaning. They represent a sacralization of things that are important to the continuation of life and see the divine as imanent in everything that exists. Since they perceive humans as existing in the womb of the supreme being, everything is sacred to some degree.
Both Marimba Ani and Richard L. Rubinstein (in his holocaust book, “The Cunning of History”) observed that the eventually dominant European religion doesn’t function that way. Marimba Ani calls it “desacralization”. Rubinstein argued that the bureaucratic elimination of “Lebensunwertes Leben” (life unworthy of life) could not have ocurred without the stage set by Christianity. Rubinstein gave the example of a “primitive” who’d need to perform a ritual after killing compared to the methodical elimination possible in the 1940s European context. He argued that, paradoxically, “more Christianity” would not have stopped this. Desacralization actually sucks the divine out of phenomenal reality and establishes HIM as an abstract entity that gave man dominion over it. In exchange for loyalty to him, there is POWER to rework and refashion in his name. After all, there is nothing particularly sacred about the “fallen” world. Western civilization, with its willingness to poop in the pot in pursuit of power, would not have been possible without this mandate.
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@ Origin
Interesting.
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I third the observations from Solitaire and Herneith that Afrofem made a very powerful statement.
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@ Zoe Jordan
I’m not Catholic (although I did go to a Catholic school for a very brief period), but I share the same sentiments. I remember attending one so-called “sanctified” church where the whole speaking in tongues deal was the norm. I also went to another private school for a couple of years where the headmaster (who was also the head pastor) would occasionally bust out the speaking in tongues.
Not gonna lie — that sh*t absolutely disturbed me and it always left me wondering, “is this really how God wants to reach out to us, like this?”
In between the tongue-twisting and the falling out on the floor spasming and the falling back during the anointings, I longed for something that was a little more…sedate. I eventually found that in an A.M.E. church. See, I like my churches quiet and humble, too.
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@Blakksage:
How do you account for Jesus’s words commanding his disciples to spread the word to the Gentiles?
Read Matthew 28:16-20, THe Great Commission, Jesus tells the remaining 11 disciples to “go and make disciples of ALL nations.”
or Mark 16:15, “He said to them, ‘Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation'”
or Acts 9:15 “But the Lord said to Ananias, ‘Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Isreal'”
or if you continue on from Matthew 15:24 to verse 28, Jesus was testing the Canaanite woman, drawing out her tenacious faith so he could publicly praise her and show his disciples that their prejudices are inappropriate. The story of the Centurion in Matthew 8:5-13 or Luke 7:1-10 has a similar theme. In the Centurion’s story, Jesus praises him that “I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith” (v10).
“Where in the Bible is it written that “We” should move on to the next people if they reject the “message?”
Try Matthew 10:14 “If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet”
or Mark 6:11 “And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, leave that place and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.”
or Luke 9:5 “If people do not welcome you, leave their town and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them.”
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
From a distance the practices look the same because they are the same, or pretty d*mn close.
There’s a real danger here of conflating the style of worship with the political right-wing beliefs. Blanc2 and I both pointed out that we remember a time when white evangelical Protestants were more likely to be on the left, and some (like Jimmy Carter) still are.
I can understand why Christians from a different tradition look askance at things like speaking in tongues, but those who practice it believe there is biblical authority and precedent for how they worship. King David danced in praise of the Lord before the people. The apostles were annointed by the Holy Spirit and spoke in tongues. “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord.” And so on.
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@ Solitaire
Even from England I am aware that these WEP that are described in the original post do not represent all charismatic and evangelical churches.
There are even charismatic Catholics and speaking in tongues is not uncommon to them. it doesn’t change the fact that it frightens me though! 😛
The most glorious experience for me is sung mass in Latin and Gregorian chanting – Love it, makes the hairs on my arms stand on end and God fill my heart x
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@ Zoe Jordan
I agree that the sung mass and Gregorian chanting are very beautiful.
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Ugh, so tired I misspelled my own handle…
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@Solitarie
I apologize if I have missed it, but was curious on if you believe in any particular religion. On here their have been talks before and some individual gave great insight on their non-belief in Gods or a high power. So just curious on your if you don’t mind sharing. If you do mind then I understand.
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LOL @Brian,
once again, you do not even qualify for a response. At least not more than what’s mentioned here! I highly encourage you to do some more studying!
Selah!
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@ Sharina
I don’t mind sharing that with you, although I don’t have an simple label to put on it.
I was mostly raised traditional mainstream United Methodist, but in an extended family that was pretty mixed so I had a fair amount of exposure to other types of Christianity, including Catholicism.
I started seriously questioning the faith in my teens. I came really close to being an atheist, but I still felt a connection to something divine that I could not explain. Where I ended up is, I think, best described as a pantheist. Someone who feels most connected to the ineffable when in nature. A lot of what I believe corresponds with Daoism, but I’m not strictly a Daoist, either.
One of my core tenets of belief is that I don’t know. Everything I believe in may not be true, and I’m okay with that. It’s not exactly agnostic because I do believe in certain things. I’m just completely open about and comfortable with the fact that I may be partially or entirely mistaken — because I don’t think the divine is fully understandable in this life. The Dao that can be understood is not the true Dao.
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@ Solitaire
How beautiful ❤
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@blakksage
I have studied the one book that is worth studying, the Bible. Your response tells me that you either you can’t respond or you don’t want to respond. And the Bible tells me that God’s message is to be spread to all people. As Peter said in Acts 10, “But God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean.” (v. 28). Read Acts 10, read about how the Gift of the Holy Spirit was given to all who heard the message, even the Gentiles. Maybe you should be the one studying more….
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@Solitaire
Thanks for sharing. I was raised southern baptist myself and became Mormon (my husband’s faith) a year before we were married. I have noticed with myself that there is always a pint of reevaluation of my faith each time. I cling to it because I believe in a higher power, but a part of me always pulls away eventually. I never feel whole until I am meditating.
.
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There is a supreme power. Right now it is sitting down somewhere(with a cup of coffee perhaps?) chuckling at peoples’ whims and fancies when they attempt to understand its’ nature.
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@Herneith
Profound and funny. You have the gift of discernment.
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@ Zoe
Thank you
@ Sharina
My father was raised Baptist, and the one condition he made on his marriage was that the children wouldn’t be baptized as infants. He also told us his reason why when we were growing up, and I always thought the Baptist position on baptism made more sense than the Methodist. I actually insisted on being immersed! Our church didn’t have a baptristry, so my Methodist minister made arrangements to perform my baptism at the Baptist church down the street. Pretty sure that never happened in my small hometown before or since.
Meditation is a good practice even for people who don’t get anything particularly spiritual out of it. If that is when you most connect to the presence of the divine, then you have found the path that works for you. That connection is the most important thing, whether one reaches it by meditating, listening to the mass being said, dancing and chanting, or walking through a field of grass.
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Solitaire said;
‘Meditation is a good practice even for people who don’t get anything particularly spiritual out of it. If that is when you most connect to the presence of the divine, then you have found the path that works for you. That connection is the most important thing, whether one reaches it by meditating, listening to the mass being said, dancing and chanting, or walking through a field of grass.’
This is spot on. What I know for sure through my own observation is that those with an inner spiritual life (not necessarily mean religious.) are happy and grounded and those without usually are not.
I like the word ‘higher power’ because it can mean whatever you choose it to, basically it just means that you accept there is something out there greater than yourself, it could be God, the universe, nature, a departed loved one… Whatever you need it to be.
I have heard said prayer is talking to your higher power, asking for guidance or what you need and meditation is listening to the answers,
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Update: In the election, 81% of White Evangelical Protestants went for Trump, much higher than the 69% he polled at in October. Source: CNN.
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So much for christian brotherhood!
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
That you did. How does it feel?
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@ Lord of Mirkwood
Yeah, I’m honestly not sure this week was a fair test, not with the Four Toupees of the Apocalypse riding forth to break open the seals.
You did win, I’m not denying that. But I still have the question in my mind of whether you could pull it off in more normal times.
Whenever we may see those again…
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Update: In 2011 just 30% of White Evangelical Protestants believed that an elected official “who commits an immoral act in their personal life can still behave ethically and fulfill their duties” as a public servant, according to PRRI. In 2016 that had jumped to 72%.
Source:
http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2017/11/19/why-evangelicals-are-again-backing-republican-despite-allegations-sexual-misconduct/nls3lkhOHopU5fUe6bM2hJ/story.html
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White supremacy is prevalent in these so called conservative white evangelical circles, see Rat Roberson and his ilk. All these cretins and their agendas always talking about family values and being against abortion and gay people and they are the biggest hypocrites on the planet. And a great number of them are 45 supporters and sexual predators and deviants.
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In 2011 they had an expectation that they would never be outed as hypocrites for their own shameful actions… in 2016, they’re hedging their bets so their high horse isn’t quite so high to fall from.
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In 2011 just 30% of White Evangelical Protestants believed that an elected official “who commits an immoral act in their personal life can still behave ethically and fulfill their duties” as a public servant, according to PRRI. In 2016 that had jumped to 72%.
Most of the poll respondents are probably perverted themselves. Besides, who’d want to shake hands with these malfeasants? Other perverts.
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@ Herneith
Now I understand why they make such a big deal about transgender bathroom bills.
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http://herneith.d.pr/t10Cds
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Doesn’t matter that they have a cross probably on that’s set to flames where they wear their pointed hoods.
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*probably one that’s set To flames * typo^^^^
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These are the same Christians that went to church on Sunday and had picnics while some poor black person was being lynched and they took photographs for postcards.
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This article which came out earlier today focuses on what really turned me off about my experience growing up in the USA – how white Christians use their religion to justify all sorts of hatred and atrocities, all in the name of safeguarding the culture to which they cling.
The racial demons that help explain evangelical support for Trump
https://www.vox.com/the-big-idea/2018/4/30/17301282/race-evangelicals-trump-support-gerson-atlantic-sexism-segregation-south
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@ jefe
Thanks for the link. It is sad that such an article even had to be written. These are the descendants of the very people who supported slavery and Jim Crow, practising the very same religion, so I do not see what the huge mystery is.
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I think there is a huge blind spot among them and in the USA in general. It is like the unspoken thing which governs American culture.
It is sad that, although such an article is written, that the majority of Americans still will never know or have any idea.
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